0), an
important commercial centre at the head of navigation on the lower
Magdalena; Girardot, a railway centre on the upper Magdalena; and
Quibdo, a small river town at the head of navigation on the Atrato.

_Communications._--The railway problem in Colombia is one of peculiar
difficulty. The larger part of the inhabited and productive districts of
the republic is situated in the mountainous departments of the interior,
and is separated from the coast by low, swampy, malarial plains, and by
very difficult mountain chains. These centres of production are also
separated from each other by high ridges and deep valleys, making it
extremely difficult to connect them by a single transportation route.
The one common outlet for these districts is the Magdalena river, whose
navigable channel penetrates directly into the heart of the country.
From Bogota the Spaniards constructed two partially-paved highways, one
leading down to the Magdalena in the vicinity of Honda, while the other
passed down into the upper valley of the same river in a south-westerly
direction, over which communication was maintained with Popayan and
other settlements of southern Colombia and Ecuador. This highway was
known as the _camino real_. Political independence and misrule led to
the abandonment of these roads, and they are now little better than the
bridle-paths which are usually the only means of communication between
the scattered communities of the Cordilleras. In some of the more
thickly settled and prosperous districts of the Eastern Cordillera these
bridle paths have been so much improved that they may be considered
reasonably good mountain roads, the traffic over them being that of pack
animals and not of wheeled vehicles. Navigation on the lower Magdalena
closely resembles that of the Mississippi, the same type of light-draft,
flat-bottomed steamboat being used, and similar obstacles and dangers to
navigation being encountered. There is also the same liability to change
its channel, as shown in the case of Mompox, once an important and
prosperous town of the lower plain situated on the main channel, now a
decaying, unimportant place on a shallow branch 20 m. east of the main
river. Small steamers also navigate the lower Cauca and Nechi rivers,
and a limited service is maintained on the upper Cauca.

With three exceptions all the railway lines of the country lead to the
Magdalena, and are dependent upon its steamship service for
transportatio